am advanced toward La Fleur.

"My cook told me that you were here, and I came down, thinking that you
might want to see me."

"This is Madam La Fleur," interpolated Miss Panney, "the celebrated chef
who cooks for Dr. Tolbridge. She came, I think, to see Mrs. Drane."

"Not altogether. Oh, no, indeed," said La Fleur, humbly smiling and
bowing, with her eyes downcast and her head on one side. "I wished, very
much, also, to pay my respects to Miss Haverley. I am only a cook, and I
am much obliged to this good lady--Miss Panic, I think is the name--"

"Panney," sharply interpolated the old lady.

"Beg pardon, I am sure, Miss Panney--for what she has said about me; but
when I come to pay my respects to Mrs. Drane, I wish to do the same to
the lady of the house."

There was a gravity and sedateness in Miriam's countenance, which was not
at all school-girlish, and which pleased La Fleur; in her eyes it gave
the girl an air of distinction.

"I am glad to see you," said Miriam, and turned to Miss Panney, as if
wondering at that lady's continued stay in the kitchen. Miss Panney
understood the look.

"I am getting points from La Fleur, my dear," she said, "cooking
points,--you ought to do that. She can give you the most wonderful
information about things you ought to know. Now, La Fleur, as you want to
see Mrs. Drane, and it is time I had started for home, it will be well
for us to go upstairs and leave the kitchen to Molly Tooney."

Miss Panney was half way up the stairs when La Fleur detained Miriam by a
touch on the arm.

"I will give you all the points you want, my dear young lady," she said.
"You have brains, and that is the great thing needful in overseeing
cooking. And I will come some day on purpose to tell you how the dishes
that your brother likes, and you like, ought to be cooked to make them
delicious, and you shall be able to tell any one how they should be done,
and understand what is the matter with them if they are not done
properly. All this the lady of the house ought to know, and I can tell
you anything you ask me, for there is nothing about cooking that I do not
thoroughly understand; but I will not go upstairs now, and I will not
detain you from your visitor. I will take a turn in the grounds, and when
the lady has gone, I will ask leave to speak with Mrs. Drane."

With her head on one side, and her smile and her bow, La Fleur left the
kitchen by the outer door. She stepped quickly toward the barn,